The concept of an industry owned portal, to counter what is commonly described as the emerging duopoly in England and Wales, is nothing new. The NAEA backed Property Live, for example, which sank without ever having an impact despite its advantages.
Agents' Mutual came onto the scene last year with a new model which seeks to use property listings themselves as a weapon of war' through the list on only one other portal' rule. The idea is basically that if property listings be the food of portals', then lets put the big two' on a diet through the constriction of data flow, consequently reducing their standing as one stop shops in the eyes of consumers.
There is some logic behind this approach, however consumers have to know of the new site in the first place to appreciate what it offers and expose the established sites' depleted stock. That's just down to how much money the new site has to market itself and therein lies by far the biggest challenge: being heard above the established sites which have great natural Google positions and high profit margins to invest in advertising.
The Kevin Costner build it and they will come' dream does not apply online. The web is littered with sites which have good property content through one mechanism or other.
If the new site can achieve mass awareness then the one other portal rule' will give consumers a reason to come back to it - even if the property volumes are small compared to their hitherto default selection. But if a consumer has been using both Rightmove and Zoopla, then the new site has no unique property content to offer.
The one other portal rule' arguably introduces risk to agents by asking them to endure competitive disadvantage in respect of other agents in their local area while the new site looks to gain consumer traction. Agents not participating will continue to wield the names of the big two to potential vendors and will no doubt accuse those participating in the Mutual as putting their interests above those of the vendor.
The one other portal rule' must be matched with a marketing effort to do the risk justice. Getting the requisite broad base of quality Google positions may be a problem. They are incredibly cost effective once achieved and the big two continue to enjoy this advantage daily. It costs huge amounts to compete against this through paid search positions at a level that will move the needle significantly.
The situation in Scotland is very different for lettings. The market enjoys a relatively unheard of thing called portal choice which Citylets is proud to have contributed to as a stand alone, independent brand. We do not partner for distribution with either of the two big brands as this is tantamount to deploying them to the region and advancing the conditions that precipitated the emergence of mutuals in the first place.
How odd it is that the local Scottish site that did partner with Zoopla now apparently calls upon individual agents to partake in a mutual type scheme and list on one other site, whilst the portal itself continues to engage in the wholesale feeding of its listings to Zoopla. This seems rather back to front to put it mildly and the very antithesis of the mutual concept.
*Thomas Ashdown is a property portal veteran. He founded Scottish lettings site, Citylets, in 1999 and is the longest continually serving MD in the UK portal sector.
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